WASHINGTON — Last week’s primary election ushered in the defeat of two members from Texas’ congressional delegation, guaranteeing at least a dozen of the state’s 38 incumbents will depart the House next year — a major loss of seniority for a state known for its influence on Capitol Hill.
Four-term U.S. Rep. Dan Crenshaw, R-Atascocita, was unseated by Conroe state Rep. Steve Toth, while U.S. Rep. Tony Gonzales, R-San Antonio, heeded calls from House GOP leadership to drop out of his runoff after he admitted to having an affair with a staffer who died by suicide.
Additionally, Houston Democratic Reps. Al Green and Christian Menefee are going head to head in a May runoff that is guaranteed to send a third member home, on top of the nine incumbents who are retiring or giving up their seats to run for other offices.
The record turnover would be upped to 13 if Rep. Julie Johnson, D-Farmers Branch, loses her runoff to Colin Allred, her predecessor in Congress.
Texas sends 38 representatives to the House, more than any state except California. One of the state’s two Senate seats could also change hands if Attorney General Ken Paxton prevails in a runoff against Republican Sen. John Cornyn.
Beyond the primaries, at least three House members face competitive general election races that could send even more incumbents packing at the end of the year. And even if Cornyn survives his primary, Democrats are hopeful that state Rep. James Talarico of Austin can make a run at flipping the Senate seat in November.
The wave of departures comes after last year’s GOP-led redistricting, which upended some candidates’ plans and spurred retirements across Texas, including that of Democratic Reps. Lloyd Doggett of Austin and Marc Veasey of Fort Worth, two of the delegation’s longest-tenured members.
The number of representatives leaving has already surpassed Texas’ previous record from 2018, when 10 members retired, ran for other offices or lost reelection.
Here are a few more statistics to describe the scale of this year’s exodus and what it means for Texas’ clout in Congress.
Years of experience
When Trump began his first term in the White House, Texas was at a period of peak clout in Congress. The state’s House delegation brought a median of 12 years of experience and chaired seven committees.
That plummeted after the 2018 midterm turnover, which brought the median tenure down to six years for the delegation that was sworn in on Jan. 3, 2019. That number dropped further yet, to a median of just four years, after the 2022 elections.
The median tenure of next year’s delegation will hinge the outcome of the fall general election. If every incumbent who won their nomination last week goes on to win in November, the median tenure of the next delegation will be six years, regardless of the outcome of Green and Johnson’s runoffs.
Still, the delegation’s seniority would take an additional hit if Green, who has been in Congress for more than two decades, loses the nomination to Menefee. Green ran in Menefee’s 18th District after his own seat was redrawn into a Republican stronghold. Menefee took office in February after winning a special election to replace Sylvester Turner, who died in office last year.
In the March 3 primary, Menefee received close to 2,000 more votes than Green, barely holding an edge over the longtime congressman but falling short of the 50% vote threshold needed to avoid a runoff. If Green loses, he will join Doggett and Veasey as Democratic casualties of redistricting.
Green is one of only six incumbent House members from Texas elected before the Obama administration. Of that group, two — Doggett and Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Austin — are retiring, and a third, Rep. Henry Cuellar, D-Laredo, is being targeted by Republicans in November.
Number of retirements
Nine representatives announced their retirements ahead of the March 3 primary.
A total of 38 Texans have left or announced their departure from the House since the beginning of the Trump era almost 10 years ago, more than half of them from retirements.
Redistricting prompted Doggett, in Congress since 1995, to retire rather than wage a primary against Rep. Greg Casar, D-Austin. Veasey, in Congress since 2013, retired after his district was scrambled.
In addition, Reps. Jasmine Crockett, D-Dallas, and Wesley Hunt, R-Houston, both gave up reelection to run for the U.S. Senate, and Rep. Chip Roy, R-Austin, is running for Texas attorney general. Three other Republicans — McCaul and Reps. Jodey Arrington and Troy Nehls — also added to the tally of retirements.
Nationally, 2026 has already tied 2018 for the most House retirements in a single election cycle this century. For Texas, the departure of so many members at once will undo decades of accumulated seniority and influence that the delegation has built up in Congress.
Committee assignments
In Congress, seniority is the main way to amass power and secure high-profile committee assignments.
The number of House committee chairs from Texas has whittled down from seven in Trump’s first term to three. From 2017 to 2019, Texas representatives chaired powerful committees including Agriculture, Rules, and Ways and Means; Rep. Kevin Brady used his perch atop the latter panel to help oversee passage of the landmark Tax Cuts and Jobs Act.
Now, Texans lead just one high-profile panel in the lower chamber: the House Budget Committee, chaired by Arrington, a Lubbock Republican who is retiring. The committee crafts the annual budget, giving Arrington a say over federal dollars and putting him at the center of Republicans’ tax-and-spending megabill, known as the One Big Beautiful Bill, last year.
The Texas delegation also controls two other gavels: Rep. Brian Babin, R-Woodville, chairs the Science, Space and Technology Committee, and Rep. Roger Williams, R-Willow Park, oversees the Small Business Committee.
Babin and Williams are two of only eight Texas incumbents seeking reelection whose tenure in the House predates Trump’s first term. The others are GOP Reps. Pete Sessions, John Carter and Randy Weber, and Democratic Reps. Joaquin Castro, Cuellar and Green. All have served continually except for Sessions, who lost his seat for a term from 2019 to 2021.
In the upper chamber, Sen. Ted Cruz chairs the Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation.
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